EU clears Google's Motorola bid

European regulators announced Monday they are giving an unconditional green light to Google's proposed $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola Mobility.

The approval from the European Union marks a victory for Google as it seeks to absorb Motorola Mobility's portfolio of more than 17,000 patents. A decision from U.S. regulators at the Department of Justice is expected this week.

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"We have approved the acquisition of Motorola Mobility by Google because, upon careful examination, this transaction does not itself raise competition issues," said Joaquín Almunia, the European Commission’s vice president in charge of competition policy, in a statement. "Of course, the commission will continue to keep a close eye on the behavior of all market players in the sector, particularly the increasingly strategic use of patents."

Google announced its bid for Motorola Mobility in August 2011, describing the proposed acquisition as one that would "supercharge Android" and boost its commitment to the wireless phone market. From Day One, the search giant insisted that it would keep Motorola Mobility as a separate business that would still be a licensee of Android and that the operating system itself would remain an open platform.

However, the proposed $12.5 billion buy worried some industry insiders, who saw it mostly as a defensive patent portfolio play at a time when the entire smartphone industry remains locked in a vicious patent lawsuit war.

Others expressed caution that Google would gain Motorola Mobility's key standards patents — in areas like Wi-Fi and online video — that are essential for companies to license in order to compete in the market for devices and technologies.

To dampen concerns, Google moved as recently as last week to notify worldwide standards bodies that it would continue licensing those patents, and on a fair and reasonable basis. But EU regulators, in announcing their approval on Monday, said they believed "the proposed transaction would not significantly change the existing market situation in this respect."

It is likely regulators in Brussels and elsewhere will monitor the company to ensure it does license those patents under fair and reasonable terms.

Don Harrison, vice president and deputy general counsel at Google, later described the EU's decision as "an important milestone in the approval process, and it moves us closer to closing the deal."

"We are now just waiting for decisions from a few other jurisdictions before we can close this transaction," he added.

In addition to U.S. approval, other regulators still must weigh the deal. That includes in China, which has until March 20 to make a decision on whether to continue to evaluate Google's bid for Motorola Mobility, or approve it.

This article first appeared on POLITICO Pro at 1:43 p.m. on February 13, 2012.